Cloud Functions

Cloud Functions is Google Cloud’s event-driven serverless compute platform.
Run your code locally or in the cloud without having to provision servers. Go from
code to deploy with continuous delivery and monitoring tools. Cloud Functions scales
up or down, so you pay only for compute resources you use. Easily create end-to-end
complex development scenarios by connecting with existing Google Cloud or
third-party services.

No servers to provision, manage, or upgrade

Automatically scale based on the load

Simplify complex application development across different languages

Integrated monitoring, logging, and distributed tracing

Built-in security at role and per function level based on the principle of least privilege

You are only billed for your function’s execution time, metered to the
nearest 100 milliseconds. You pay nothing when your function is idle. Cloud
Functions automatically spins up and backs down in response to events.

Avoid lock-in with open technology

Use open source FaaS (function as a service) framework to run functions across
multiple environments and prevent lock-in. Supported environments include Cloud
Functions, local development environment, on-premises, Cloud Run, Cloud Run for
Anthos, and other Knative-based serverless environments.

Common use cases

Serverless application back ends

Trigger your code from Google Cloud services or call it directly from any web,
mobile, or backend application. Cloud Functions provides a connective layer of logic
that lets you integrate and extend Google Cloud and third-party services, making it
possible to rapidly build serverless applications that are highly available, secure,
and cost-effective.

Integration with third-party services and APIs

Use Cloud Functions to surface your own microservices via HTTP APIs or integrate with
third-party services that offer webhook integrations to quickly extend your
application with powerful capabilities such as sending a confirmation email after a
successful Stripe payment or responding to Twilio text message events.

Serverless mobile back ends

Use Cloud Functions directly from Firebase to extend your application functionality
without spinning up a server. Run your code in response to user actions, analytics,
and authentication events to keep your users engaged with event-based notifications
and offload CPU- and networking-intensive tasks to Google Cloud.

Serverless IoT back ends

Use Cloud Functions with Cloud IoT Core and other fully managed services to build back
ends for Internet of Things (IoT) device telemetry data collection, real-time
processing, and analysis. Cloud Functions allows you to apply custom logic to each
event as it arrives.

Real-time data processing systems

Execute your code in response to changes in data. Cloud Functions can respond to
events from Google Cloud services such as Cloud Storage, Pub/Sub, and Cloud
Logging, allowing you to power a variety of serverless real-time data processing
systems.

Intelligent applications

Easily inject artificial intelligence into your applications.

Virtual assistants and conversational experiences

Use Cloud Functions with Cloud Speech API and Dialogflow to extend your products and
services with voice- and text-based natural conversational experiences that help users
get things done. Connect with users on Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, Facebook
Messenger, and other popular platforms and devices.

Video and image analysis

Use Cloud Functions with Video Intelligence API and Cloud Vision API to retrieve
relevant information from videos and images, enabling you to search, discover, and
derive insight from your media content.

Sentiment analysis

Use Cloud Functions in combination with Cloud Natural Language API to reveal the
structure and meaning of text and add powerful sentiment analysis and intent
extraction capabilities to your applications.

Go from code to deploy, with integrated monitoring. Get full observability and
diagnosability for your application with Cloud Trace and Cloud Debugger. Additionally, get support
for local and disconnected development/debugging using open sourced functions
framework.

Scales automatically

Serve users from zero to planet-scale without even thinking about any
infrastructure. Cloud Functions automatically manages and scales underlying
infrastructure with the size of workload.

No server management

Deploy your code and let Google run and scale it for you. Cloud Functions
abstracts away all the underlying infrastructure, so that you can focus on your
code and build applications faster than ever before.

Runs code in response to events

Cloud Functions allows you to trigger your code from Google Cloud, Firebase, and
Google Assistant, or call it directly from any web, mobile, or backend application
via HTTP.

Pay only for what you use

You are only billed for your function’s execution time, metered to the
nearest 100 milliseconds. You pay nothing when your function is idle. Cloud
Functions automatically spins up and backs down in response to events.

Avoid lock-in with open technology

Use open source FaaS (function as a service) framework to run functions across
multiple environments and prevent lock-in. Supported environments include Cloud
Functions, local development environment, on-premises, Cloud Run, Cloud Run for
Anthos, and other Knative-based serverless environments.

Pricing

Cloud Functions is priced according to how long your function runs, how many times
it's invoked, and how many resources you provision for the function.